Today I Learned

[Mark H.]

25 minutes ago, Piggy 1 said:

Yer sayin yer frugal? Or just plain cheap 😄

Yes and no.

25 minutes ago, Piggy 1 said:

Jack and Grey Goose are as well. Why cant those prices be permanent?

Jim Beam too - to help us all come clean.

[Piggy 1]

10 minutes ago, Mark H. said:

Yes and no.

Jim Beam too - to help us all come clean.

Not A fan ,unless the Black.

[Tracker]

                                          

[Wideleft]

Paul Fairie is a great follow on twitter:

 

 

 

Edited February 2, 2023 by Wideleft

[Mark F]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The Tennessee Titans are switching Nissan Stadium to a high-tech artificial surface for the 2023 season.

The move is spurred by NFL studies showing the team's natural surface may have contributed to more lower-body injuries from 2018-2021 than the six NFL venues that use the sort of monofilament fields the team will now turn to.

The Hellas Matrix Turf the Titans will install is currently in use at AT&T Stadium (Cowboys), NRG Stadium (Texans) and SoFi Stadium (Chargers and Rams).

It's the same turf the Titans installed in their practice bubble last offseason and they have been pleased with it. It's got all organic infill of cork and coconut that requires regular watering.

https://www.paulkuharsky.com/news/titans-installing-high-tech-artificial-surface-in-nissan-stadium

[Tracker]

 

 

                                  

[HardCoreBlue]

On 2023-01-28 at 4:35 PM, Mark H. said:

Yes and no.

Jim Beam too - to help us all come clean.

Yup the trained eye knows the difference between frugal and cheap.

[Mark H.]

5 hours ago, HardCoreBlue said:

Yup the trained eye knows the difference between frugal and cheap.

Nothing wrong with some selections...on the lower shelves...

[Piggy 1]

On 2023-02-02 at 4:12 PM, Mark H. said:

Nothing wrong with some selections...on the lower shelves...

But at my age its getting hard to bend down........😉

[Tracker]

19 hours ago, Piggy 1 said:

But at my age its getting hard to bend down........😉

Your body is trying to tell you something.

[Tracker]

 

                            

[Wideleft]

RETROPOLIS

Mississippi banned ‘Sesame Street’ for showing Black and White kids playing

By Kristin Hunt

February 5, 2023 at 7:00 a.m. EST

 

In April 1970, members of Mississippi’s newly formed State Commission for Educational Television met to discuss Big Bird and Cookie Monster.

“Sesame Street” had debuted on public TV the previous November, and the earliest episodes would look familiar today: cartoons about the letter O, counting exercises with ice cream cones and Ernie singing in the bathtub.

But the all-White commission decided Mississippi was “not yet ready for it,” according to one member, because it showed Black and White kids playing together. In a 3-2 vote, the commission banned “Sesame Street” from broadcasting on the state-run ETV network.

“The state has enough problems to face up to without adding to them,” an anonymous member of the commission, which was appointed by segregationist Gov. John Bell Williams (D), told the Associated Press.

None of the board’s members would speak on the record about the ban. The commission worried about sinking its fledgling system just as it was launching. At the time, ETV operated only one channel near Jackson, but it had plans to expand statewide after securing hard-won funding. It was allegedly spooked by state lawmakers, who had objected to educational programs promoting integration and could meddle with the commission’s funding. Some had already objected to ETV’s $5.3 million appropriation in the state budget.

Big Bird and the man inside: Inseparable on Sesame Street for almost 50 years

“I think it’s a tragedy for both the white and black children of Mississippi,” Joan Ganz Cooney, a television producer who co-created “Sesame Street,” told the AP.

“Sesame Street” had landed in a bleak landscape for children’s TV. Saturday morning cartoons were big business, thanks to ads for sugary breakfast cereals, but during the week, kids were mostly stuck with reruns of “a lot of junk,” as Ganz Cooney put it. Still, children were clearly drawn to television, and hungry for more. Lloyd Morrisett, one of the co-creators of “Sesame Street,” noticed that his young daughter watched test patterns on their television, waiting for something to come on.

“When kids’ TV first started out, it was mostly old cartoons with hosts,” said Linda Simensky, a visiting professor of media studies at the University of Pennsylvania and former head of content for PBS Kids. “And these hosts, in the middle of their hosting duties, would start selling bread.”

She said that among TV executives, “there was sort of this general feeling that kids would watch anything that looks like it’s for kids, and they didn’t want to spend a lot of money.”

In the 1960s, these shows rarely had diverse casts of Black, Brown and White kids. There were exceptions at the local level: Ron Simon, head curator at the Paley Center for Media, points to New York’s “Wonderama” as an example of a show making a “conscious effort of integrating.” But nationally, the landscape was mostly White. It was still so rare to see Black actors of any age on television that Jet magazine published a page of radio and TV appearances by Black entertainers each week, from Eartha Kitt on “Mission: Impossible” to Sammy Davis Jr. on “The Hollywood Palace.”

“Sesame Street” not only wanted to teach children through educational programming they’d actually enjoy — it wanted to specifically target kids from low-income families, who were entering school at a disadvantage. The show was designed with this audience in mind, from the research and writing to the casting.

In addition to many of Jim Henson’s Muppets, “Sesame Street” featured human characters like Bob and Mr. Hooper, both White men, and Gordon and Susan, a married Black couple. Children of all races roamed Sesame Street (which was modeled largely on real-life blocks in New York’s Harlem, Upper West Side and the Bronx), a choice the creators hoped would impart positive images of integration — and give each child watching a chance to see people who looked like them on-screen.

‘Schoolhouse Rock’ premiered 50 years ago — and shaped a generation

But first they had to hear about it. Ganz Cooney stationed outreach coordinators in different parts of the country to make sure the show was recognizable and accessible to as many children as possible.

That outreach, combined with $4 million in funding from the Lyndon B. Johnson administration and another $4 million in private grants, meant there was “a lot of goodwill surrounding the show” when it began hitting local affiliates in November 1969, said David Kamp, author of “Sunny Days: The Children’s Television Revolution That Changed America.”

“Sesame Street” received rave reviews from public luminaries like Jesse Jackson and Orson Welles, as well as many parents who wrote to newspapers to heap praise on the show.

“My 2-year-old, who can hardly talk, is running around the house identifying letters like H and W and numbers like 9 and 3 since he’s been watching ‘Sesame Street,’” wrote a Los Angeles Times reader from Glendale, Ariz.

‘Some sad and scary things’: Mister Rogers consoled kids by telling them the truth

And then there was Mississippi.

In fairness, the state was likely not alone in its reluctance to broadcast interracial friendships. When KTAL in Shreveport dropped “Sesame Street” in its second season, claiming it didn’t have the money to air it, a fan wrote to Time, “The ostensible reason was that the show was too expensive. Actually it was too black.”

In the aftermath of the Mississippi decision, letters poured into ETV, protesting the ban. “There will always be people in Mississippi and across the nation who will find an integrated television cast offensive,” read one letter printed by United Press International. “But there are probably more conscientious parents who will put the education of their children ahead of their personal prejudices, and these people should not be denied a choice.” WDAM, a local station based in Laurel, Miss., urged the commission to reverse the vote and offered to air “Sesame Street” itself if ETV wouldn’t.

The board was doubtless embarrassed by the attention, not expecting its “postponement” of the show, as members characterized it, to make news across the country. (The Albuquerque Journal, for example, called the decision a “crying shame,” swiping at Mississippi’s “education levels,” which lagged behind other states.)

“That was kind of a spasm of the old ethos,” Kamp said. “I think most of the country, even in the South, was trending in the other direction.”

ETV scrambled to lift the ban, promising viewers on May 23 that “Sesame Street” would air in a matter of weeks. The show appeared on local TV listings by June 8, and that fall, the board sponsored a special episode.

As part of a 14-city national tour, the cast of “Sesame Street” stopped by Jackson for a free live show on Sept. 6, presented in cooperation with the State Commission for Educational Television. Over the course of an hour, Big Bird and his friends Bob, Susan, Gordon and Mr. Hooper entertained families with songs, jokes and questions, encouraging audience participation.

It was not quite an apology, but a display of an uneasy alliance between a progressive show and a conservative board, all in front of an integrated crowd of ecstatic children.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2023/02/05/sesame-street-ban-mississippi/

 

[HardCoreBlue]

1 hour ago, Wideleft said:

RETROPOLIS

Mississippi banned ‘Sesame Street’ for showing Black and White kids playing

By Kristin Hunt

February 5, 2023 at 7:00 a.m. EST

 

In April 1970, members of Mississippi’s newly formed State Commission for Educational Television met to discuss Big Bird and Cookie Monster.

“Sesame Street” had debuted on public TV the previous November, and the earliest episodes would look familiar today: cartoons about the letter O, counting exercises with ice cream cones and Ernie singing in the bathtub.

But the all-White commission decided Mississippi was “not yet ready for it,” according to one member, because it showed Black and White kids playing together. In a 3-2 vote, the commission banned “Sesame Street” from broadcasting on the state-run ETV network.

“The state has enough problems to face up to without adding to them,” an anonymous member of the commission, which was appointed by segregationist Gov. John Bell Williams (D), told the Associated Press.

None of the board’s members would speak on the record about the ban. The commission worried about sinking its fledgling system just as it was launching. At the time, ETV operated only one channel near Jackson, but it had plans to expand statewide after securing hard-won funding. It was allegedly spooked by state lawmakers, who had objected to educational programs promoting integration and could meddle with the commission’s funding. Some had already objected to ETV’s $5.3 million appropriation in the state budget.

Big Bird and the man inside: Inseparable on Sesame Street for almost 50 years

“I think it’s a tragedy for both the white and black children of Mississippi,” Joan Ganz Cooney, a television producer who co-created “Sesame Street,” told the AP.

“Sesame Street” had landed in a bleak landscape for children’s TV. Saturday morning cartoons were big business, thanks to ads for sugary breakfast cereals, but during the week, kids were mostly stuck with reruns of “a lot of junk,” as Ganz Cooney put it. Still, children were clearly drawn to television, and hungry for more. Lloyd Morrisett, one of the co-creators of “Sesame Street,” noticed that his young daughter watched test patterns on their television, waiting for something to come on.

“When kids’ TV first started out, it was mostly old cartoons with hosts,” said Linda Simensky, a visiting professor of media studies at the University of Pennsylvania and former head of content for PBS Kids. “And these hosts, in the middle of their hosting duties, would start selling bread.”

She said that among TV executives, “there was sort of this general feeling that kids would watch anything that looks like it’s for kids, and they didn’t want to spend a lot of money.”

In the 1960s, these shows rarely had diverse casts of Black, Brown and White kids. There were exceptions at the local level: Ron Simon, head curator at the Paley Center for Media, points to New York’s “Wonderama” as an example of a show making a “conscious effort of integrating.” But nationally, the landscape was mostly White. It was still so rare to see Black actors of any age on television that Jet magazine published a page of radio and TV appearances by Black entertainers each week, from Eartha Kitt on “Mission: Impossible” to Sammy Davis Jr. on “The Hollywood Palace.”

“Sesame Street” not only wanted to teach children through educational programming they’d actually enjoy — it wanted to specifically target kids from low-income families, who were entering school at a disadvantage. The show was designed with this audience in mind, from the research and writing to the casting.

In addition to many of Jim Henson’s Muppets, “Sesame Street” featured human characters like Bob and Mr. Hooper, both White men, and Gordon and Susan, a married Black couple. Children of all races roamed Sesame Street (which was modeled largely on real-life blocks in New York’s Harlem, Upper West Side and the Bronx), a choice the creators hoped would impart positive images of integration — and give each child watching a chance to see people who looked like them on-screen.

‘Schoolhouse Rock’ premiered 50 years ago — and shaped a generation

But first they had to hear about it. Ganz Cooney stationed outreach coordinators in different parts of the country to make sure the show was recognizable and accessible to as many children as possible.

That outreach, combined with $4 million in funding from the Lyndon B. Johnson administration and another $4 million in private grants, meant there was “a lot of goodwill surrounding the show” when it began hitting local affiliates in November 1969, said David Kamp, author of “Sunny Days: The Children’s Television Revolution That Changed America.”

“Sesame Street” received rave reviews from public luminaries like Jesse Jackson and Orson Welles, as well as many parents who wrote to newspapers to heap praise on the show.

“My 2-year-old, who can hardly talk, is running around the house identifying letters like H and W and numbers like 9 and 3 since he’s been watching ‘Sesame Street,’” wrote a Los Angeles Times reader from Glendale, Ariz.

‘Some sad and scary things’: Mister Rogers consoled kids by telling them the truth

And then there was Mississippi.

In fairness, the state was likely not alone in its reluctance to broadcast interracial friendships. When KTAL in Shreveport dropped “Sesame Street” in its second season, claiming it didn’t have the money to air it, a fan wrote to Time, “The ostensible reason was that the show was too expensive. Actually it was too black.”

In the aftermath of the Mississippi decision, letters poured into ETV, protesting the ban. “There will always be people in Mississippi and across the nation who will find an integrated television cast offensive,” read one letter printed by United Press International. “But there are probably more conscientious parents who will put the education of their children ahead of their personal prejudices, and these people should not be denied a choice.” WDAM, a local station based in Laurel, Miss., urged the commission to reverse the vote and offered to air “Sesame Street” itself if ETV wouldn’t.

The board was doubtless embarrassed by the attention, not expecting its “postponement” of the show, as members characterized it, to make news across the country. (The Albuquerque Journal, for example, called the decision a “crying shame,” swiping at Mississippi’s “education levels,” which lagged behind other states.)

“That was kind of a spasm of the old ethos,” Kamp said. “I think most of the country, even in the South, was trending in the other direction.”

ETV scrambled to lift the ban, promising viewers on May 23 that “Sesame Street” would air in a matter of weeks. The show appeared on local TV listings by June 8, and that fall, the board sponsored a special episode.

As part of a 14-city national tour, the cast of “Sesame Street” stopped by Jackson for a free live show on Sept. 6, presented in cooperation with the State Commission for Educational Television. Over the course of an hour, Big Bird and his friends Bob, Susan, Gordon and Mr. Hooper entertained families with songs, jokes and questions, encouraging audience participation.

It was not quite an apology, but a display of an uneasy alliance between a progressive show and a conservative board, all in front of an integrated crowd of ecstatic children.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2023/02/05/sesame-street-ban-mississippi/

 

They have fully crawled out under the rock we previously thought they would stay forever.

Trump, his family and their close enablers did not cause nor invent this.

This band of ghouls did however facilitate bringing **** like this back more into mainstream norm, propped up as another legitimate side to consider by seeding in doubt, distraction, confusion and lies to really F up actual legitimate discourse. This was done purely for greed, power, status and control with absolutely no moral compass to be found.

I see it's effects right here on this site in how this band ghouls are presented by some. 

 

 

[the watcher]

On 2023-02-07 at 9:20 AM, Wideleft said:

RETROPOLIS

Mississippi banned ‘Sesame Street’ for showing Black and White kids playing

By Kristin Hunt

February 5, 2023 at 7:00 a.m. EST

 

In April 1970, members of Mississippi’s newly formed State Commission for Educational Television met to discuss Big Bird and Cookie Monster.

“Sesame Street” had debuted on public TV the previous November, and the earliest episodes would look familiar today: cartoons about the letter O, counting exercises with ice cream cones and Ernie singing in the bathtub.

But the all-White commission decided Mississippi was “not yet ready for it,” according to one member, because it showed Black and White kids playing together. In a 3-2 vote, the commission banned “Sesame Street” from broadcasting on the state-run ETV network.

“The state has enough problems to face up to without adding to them,” an anonymous member of the commission, which was appointed by segregationist Gov. John Bell Williams (D), told the Associated Press.

None of the board’s members would speak on the record about the ban. The commission worried about sinking its fledgling system just as it was launching. At the time, ETV operated only one channel near Jackson, but it had plans to expand statewide after securing hard-won funding. It was allegedly spooked by state lawmakers, who had objected to educational programs promoting integration and could meddle with the commission’s funding. Some had already objected to ETV’s $5.3 million appropriation in the state budget.

Big Bird and the man inside: Inseparable on Sesame Street for almost 50 years

“I think it’s a tragedy for both the white and black children of Mississippi,” Joan Ganz Cooney, a television producer who co-created “Sesame Street,” told the AP.

“Sesame Street” had landed in a bleak landscape for children’s TV. Saturday morning cartoons were big business, thanks to ads for sugary breakfast cereals, but during the week, kids were mostly stuck with reruns of “a lot of junk,” as Ganz Cooney put it. Still, children were clearly drawn to television, and hungry for more. Lloyd Morrisett, one of the co-creators of “Sesame Street,” noticed that his young daughter watched test patterns on their television, waiting for something to come on.

“When kids’ TV first started out, it was mostly old cartoons with hosts,” said Linda Simensky, a visiting professor of media studies at the University of Pennsylvania and former head of content for PBS Kids. “And these hosts, in the middle of their hosting duties, would start selling bread.”

She said that among TV executives, “there was sort of this general feeling that kids would watch anything that looks like it’s for kids, and they didn’t want to spend a lot of money.”

In the 1960s, these shows rarely had diverse casts of Black, Brown and White kids. There were exceptions at the local level: Ron Simon, head curator at the Paley Center for Media, points to New York’s “Wonderama” as an example of a show making a “conscious effort of integrating.” But nationally, the landscape was mostly White. It was still so rare to see Black actors of any age on television that Jet magazine published a page of radio and TV appearances by Black entertainers each week, from Eartha Kitt on “Mission: Impossible” to Sammy Davis Jr. on “The Hollywood Palace.”

“Sesame Street” not only wanted to teach children through educational programming they’d actually enjoy — it wanted to specifically target kids from low-income families, who were entering school at a disadvantage. The show was designed with this audience in mind, from the research and writing to the casting.

In addition to many of Jim Henson’s Muppets, “Sesame Street” featured human characters like Bob and Mr. Hooper, both White men, and Gordon and Susan, a married Black couple. Children of all races roamed Sesame Street (which was modeled largely on real-life blocks in New York’s Harlem, Upper West Side and the Bronx), a choice the creators hoped would impart positive images of integration — and give each child watching a chance to see people who looked like them on-screen.

‘Schoolhouse Rock’ premiered 50 years ago — and shaped a generation

But first they had to hear about it. Ganz Cooney stationed outreach coordinators in different parts of the country to make sure the show was recognizable and accessible to as many children as possible.

That outreach, combined with $4 million in funding from the Lyndon B. Johnson administration and another $4 million in private grants, meant there was “a lot of goodwill surrounding the show” when it began hitting local affiliates in November 1969, said David Kamp, author of “Sunny Days: The Children’s Television Revolution That Changed America.”

“Sesame Street” received rave reviews from public luminaries like Jesse Jackson and Orson Welles, as well as many parents who wrote to newspapers to heap praise on the show.

“My 2-year-old, who can hardly talk, is running around the house identifying letters like H and W and numbers like 9 and 3 since he’s been watching ‘Sesame Street,’” wrote a Los Angeles Times reader from Glendale, Ariz.

‘Some sad and scary things’: Mister Rogers consoled kids by telling them the truth

And then there was Mississippi.

In fairness, the state was likely not alone in its reluctance to broadcast interracial friendships. When KTAL in Shreveport dropped “Sesame Street” in its second season, claiming it didn’t have the money to air it, a fan wrote to Time, “The ostensible reason was that the show was too expensive. Actually it was too black.”

In the aftermath of the Mississippi decision, letters poured into ETV, protesting the ban. “There will always be people in Mississippi and across the nation who will find an integrated television cast offensive,” read one letter printed by United Press International. “But there are probably more conscientious parents who will put the education of their children ahead of their personal prejudices, and these people should not be denied a choice.” WDAM, a local station based in Laurel, Miss., urged the commission to reverse the vote and offered to air “Sesame Street” itself if ETV wouldn’t.

The board was doubtless embarrassed by the attention, not expecting its “postponement” of the show, as members characterized it, to make news across the country. (The Albuquerque Journal, for example, called the decision a “crying shame,” swiping at Mississippi’s “education levels,” which lagged behind other states.)

“That was kind of a spasm of the old ethos,” Kamp said. “I think most of the country, even in the South, was trending in the other direction.”

ETV scrambled to lift the ban, promising viewers on May 23 that “Sesame Street” would air in a matter of weeks. The show appeared on local TV listings by June 8, and that fall, the board sponsored a special episode.

As part of a 14-city national tour, the cast of “Sesame Street” stopped by Jackson for a free live show on Sept. 6, presented in cooperation with the State Commission for Educational Television. Over the course of an hour, Big Bird and his friends Bob, Susan, Gordon and Mr. Hooper entertained families with songs, jokes and questions, encouraging audience participation.

It was not quite an apology, but a display of an uneasy alliance between a progressive show and a conservative board, all in front of an integrated crowd of ecstatic children.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2023/02/05/sesame-street-ban-mississippi/

 

A whole lot of folks wearing folks wearing red hats  would give a deep sigh and mumble  " Ah,the good old days "

Edited February 17, 2023 by the watcher

[Tracker]

4 hours ago, the watcher said:

A whole lot of folks wearing folks wearing red hats  would give a deep sigh and mumble  " Ah, the good old days "

The red hats are only temporary when the conical white hats and robes are closeted.

[HardCoreBlue]

Just now, Tracker said:

The red hats are only temporary when the conical white hats and robes are closeted.

Yup. Not every Trump supporter is racist  but every racist is a Trump supporter.

[FrostyWinnipeg]

Today I learned...that if you want to view a paywall'd story(such as the Thistle CC closure) you can paste the URL at the Archive Today website.

Try the bottom one first before trying the top one.

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

Today i learned...

When it is sunny while raining, we call that "a sun shower"- in Tennessee they call it "the devil is kissing his wife".

And further south in true Southern USA tradition, it's referred to as "the devil is beating his wife." 

Edited March 9, 2023 by Wanna-B-Fanboy

[Wideleft]

Kakistocracy

 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

A kakistocracy (/kækɪˈstɒkrəsi/, /kækɪsˈtɒ-/) is a government run by the worst, least qualified, or most unscrupulous citizens.^{[1]: 54 [2][3]} The word was coined as early as the seventeenth century.^[4] Peter Bowler has noted in his book that there is no word for the government run by the best citizens,^[a] and that the aristarchy may be the right term, but still, it could conceivably be a kakistocracy disguised as an aristocracy.^[a]

Etymology[edit]

The word is derived from two Greek words, kakistos (κάκιστος; worst) and kratos (κράτος; rule), with a literal meaning of government by the worst people.^[5]

History[edit]

The earliest use of the word dates to the 17th century, in Paul Gosnold's A sermon Preached at the Publique Fast the ninth day of Aug. 1644 at St. Maries:^[4]

Therefore we need not make any scruple of praying against such: against those Sanctimonious Incendiaries, who have fetched fire from heaven to set their Country in combustion, have pretended Religion to raise and maintaine a most wicked rebellion: against those Nero's, who have ripped up the wombe of the mother that bare them, and wounded the breasts that gave them sucke: against those Cannibal's who feed upon the flesh and are drunke with the bloud of their own brethren: against those Catiline's who seeke their private ends in the publicke disturbance, and have set the Kingdome on fire to rost their owne egges: against those tempests of the State, those restlesse spirits who can no longer live, then be stickling and medling; who are stung with a perpetuall itch of changing and innovating, transforming our old Hierarchy into a new Presbytery, and this againe into a newer Independency; and our well-temperd Monarchy into a mad kinde of Kakistocracy. Good Lord!^[6]

English author Thomas Love Peacock later used the term in his 1829 novel The Misfortunes of Elphin, in which he explains kakistocracy represents the opposite of aristocracy, as aristos (ἄριστος) means "excellent" in Greek.^[7] In his 1838 Memoir on Slavery (which he supported), U.S. Senator William Harper compared kakistocracy to anarchy, and said it had seldom occurred:^[8]

Anarchy is not so much the absence of government as the government of the worst—not aristocracy but kakistocracy—a state of things, which to the honor of our nature, has seldom obtained amongst men, and which perhaps was only fully exemplified during the worst times of the French revolution, when that horrid hell burnt with its most horrid flame. In such a state of things, to be accused is to be condemned—to protect the innocent is to be guilty; and what perhaps is the worst effect, even men of better nature, to whom their own deeds are abhorrent, are goaded by terror to be forward and emulous in deeds of guilt and violence.

American poet James Russell Lowell used the term in 1876, in a letter to Joel Benton, writing, "What fills me with doubt and dismay is the degradation of the moral tone. Is it or is it not a result of Democracy? Is ours a 'government of the people by the people for the people,' or a Kakistocracy rather, for the benefit of knaves at the cost of fools?"^[9]

[FrostyWinnipeg]

Today I learned Windows key+H brings up voice dictation.

And it works half decently.

 

[Wideleft]

A Canadian inventor was selling rooftop solar + batteries in 1905. Then he was kidnapped, and his business fell apart.

 

If the first solar entrepreneur hadn’t been kidnapped, would fossil fuels have dominated the 20th century the way they did?

Published: October 12, 2023 11.51am EDT

 

One argument put forward in defence of fossil fuels is that they were a historical necessity, because there was no other viable substitute for much of the 20th century. We owe fossil fuels a debt of gratitude, the argument goes, because they supercharged our development. But what if I told you there was a viable alternative, and that it may have been sabotaged by fossil fuel interests from its very inception?

While researching the economics of clean energy innovation, I came across a little-known story: that of Canadian inventor George Cove, one of the world’s first renewable energy entrepreneurs. Cove invented household solar panels that looked uncannily similar to the ones being installed in homes today – they even had a rudimentary battery to keep power running when the Sun wasn’t shining. Except this wasn’t in the 1970s. Or even the 1950s. This was in 1905.

Cove’s company, Sun Electric Generator Corporation, based in New York, was capitalised at US$5 million (around US$160 million in today’s money). By 1909, the idea had gained widespread media attention. Modern Electric magazine highlighted how “given two days’ sun… [the device] will store sufficient electrical energy to light an ordinary house for a week”.

It noted how cheap solar energy could liberate people from poverty, “bringing them cheap light, heat and power, and freeing the multitude from the constant struggle for bread”. The piece went on to speculate how even aeroplanes could be powered by batteries charged by the sun. A clean energy future seemed to be there for the taking.

Vested interests?

Then, according to a report in The New York Herald on 19 October 1909, Cove was kidnapped. The condition for his release required forgoing his solar patent and shutting down the company. Cove refused and was later released near Bronx Zoo.

But after this incident, his solar business fizzled out. Which seems odd – in the years before the kidnapping, he had developed several iterations of the solar device, improving it each time.

 

Cove’s solar panel in 1909. Technical World Magazine / wiki

I can’t say with certainty if vested interests were behind it. Some at the time accused Cove of staging the kidnapping for publicity, although this would seem out of character, especially since there was no shortage of media attention. Other sources suggest that a former investor may have been behind it.

What is well-known though, is that fledgling fossil fuel companies commonly deployed unscrupulous practices towards their competitors. And solar was a threat as it is an inherently democratic technology – everyone has access to the sun – which can empower citizens and communities, unlike fossil fuels which necessitate empire-building.

Standard Oil, led by the world’s first billionaire John D Rockefeller, squashed competition so thoroughly that it compelled the government to introduce antitrust laws to combat monopolies.

Similarly, legendary inventor Thomas Edison electrocuted horses, farm animals and even a human on death row using his rival Nikola Tesla’s alternating current to show how dangerous it was, so that Edison’s own technology, the direct current, would be favoured. Cove’s Sun Electric, with its off-grid solar, would have harmed Edison’s business case for building out the electric power grid using coal-fired power.

While some scattered efforts in solar development occurred after Cove’s kidnapping, there were no major commercial activities for the next four decades until the concept was revived by Bell Labs, the research branch of Bell Telephone Company in the US. In the meantime, coal and oil grew at an unprecedented pace and were supported through taxpayer dollars and government policy. The climate crisis was arguably underway.

Four lost decades

When I discovered Cove’s story, I wanted to know what the world lost in those 40 years, and ran a thought experiment. I used a concept called Wright’s law, which has applied to most renewables – it’s the idea that as production increases, costs decline due to process improvements and learning.

 

Solar pioneer George Cove also patented an early tidal power device. Technical World Magazine / wiki

I applied this to calculate the year solar would have become cheaper than coal. To do this, I assumed solar power grew modestly between 1910 and 1950, and worked out how this additional “experience” would have translated into cost declines sooner.

In a world in which Cove succeeded and solar competed with fossil fuels from the get go, it would have trumped coal by as early as 1997 – when Bill Clinton was president and the Spice Girls were in their heyday. In reality, this event occurred in 2017.

An alternate century

Of course, this still assumes that the energy system would have been the same. It is possible that if solar were around from 1910 and never disappeared, the entire trajectory of energy innovation could have been very different – for example, maybe more research money would have been directed towards batteries to support decentralised solar. The electric grid and railways that were used to support the coal economy would have received far less investment.

Alternatively, more recent advances in manufacturing may have been essential for solar’s take-off and Cove’s continued work would not have resulted in a major change. Ultimately, it is impossible to know exactly what path humanity would have taken, but I wager that avoiding a 40 year break in solar power’s development could have spared the world huge amounts of carbon emissions.

While it might feel painful to ponder this great “what if” as the climate breaks down in front of our eyes, it can arm us with something useful: the knowledge that drawing energy from the sun is nothing radical or even new. It’s an idea as old as fossil fuel companies themselves.

The continued dominance of fossil fuels into the 21st century was not inevitable – it was a choice, just not one many of us had a say in. Fossil fuels were supported initially because we did not understand their deadly environmental impacts and later because the lobby had grown so powerful that it resisted change.

But there is hope: solar energy now provides some of the cheapest electricity humanity has ever seen, and the costs are continuing to plummet with deployment. The faster we go, the more we save. If we embrace the spirit of optimism seen during Cove’s time and make the right technology choices, we can still reach the sun-powered world he envisioned all those years ago.

https://theconversation.com/if-the-first-solar-entrepreneur-hadnt-been-kidnapped-would-fossil-fuels-have-dominated-the-20th-century-the-way-they-did-215300